STEVE KORNACKI, MSNBC ANCHOR: The U.S. military gets in the position for possible air strikes in Iraq.

Good morning and happy Father`s Day. Thanks for getting up with us today. At this hour a U.S. aircraft carrier is on its way to the Persian Gulf, giving the Pentagon the option of launching air strikes as President Obama considers possible military intervention in Iraq. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel announced yesterday that he has ordered the USS George H.W. Bush to escort ships to move from the Arabian Sea into the Gulf. Ships carry Tomahawk missiles and fighter jets, both with the capability to reach Iraq.

This morning Iraqi government forces are said to be holding back an advance of Sunni militants somewhere north of Baghdad. These forces have been reinforced by members of Shiite militia groups. Thousands of young Iraqi men answering the urgent call to arms yesterday in the southern part of the country. There are reports this morning that a number of towns have been retaken from the rebels. They still hold the big cities of Tikrit and Mosul. Maybe in Mosul today, only days after Iraq`s second largest city fell to al Qaeda-inspired insurgents, many Iraqis are willingly returning home. As many as half a million residents escaped as Mosul fell, but people are being lured back by the conquering Jihadist forces with cheap gas, food, clean streets and electricity that works for many more hours a day now than it did before. And some in Mosul telling journalists they feel safer and less oppressed than they did under the government with Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki, serving to underscore the challenges the U.S. backed government faces in regaining control of northern and Western Iraq.

Let`s go now to NBC News foreign correspondent Ayman Mohyeldin. He`s in northern Iraq for us this morning, live in the city of Erbil. Ayman, the latest reporting suggests that maybe the militants` progress has been stalled at least for the moment. What can you tell us this morning?

AYMAN MOHYELDIN, ERBIL IRAQ: Well, the situation continues to remain very tense on the outskirts of Baghdad, more importantly in the areas that are between Baghdad and some of the towns and cities that are controlled by ISIS. Now, the Iraqi government certainly trying to change the momentum and trying to get some momentum on its side, not only with its rhetoric, but also with the reality on the ground. As you mentioned, there have been centers, recruitment centers that have been open now for Shia militias to join the fight, but also you saw on Friday Prime Minister Nouri Maliki hold a meeting with some high-ranking military officials in Samarra, a very symbolic and important city for the prime minister to try to assert his control over the country and more importantly says he wants to push and repel any of the al Qaeda-linked militants` attacks that have been over the past several days plaguing some of the cities.

Now, in addition to that the Iraqi government says it will take the fight to these rebel-held areas, but a lot of people have been pointing out this is not simply an issue of military victories on the ground. There are legitimate and political grievances that have been exacerbated over the last several months by many members of the Sunni Arab community and the prime minister. And now, the question is whether or not the prime minister can build some kind of reconciliation momentum to try and win back some of these communities that are expressing their support, at least symbolically, to the al Qaeda-linked militant group, which in itself feels it has a tremendous amount of momentum on its side. It certainly has a ground swell of support in some of the areas that it is controlling and more importantly it now has an influx of weapons and cash from some of the bases that they have been able to loot and control over the past several days. So still a very tense situation throughout the entire northwestern part of Iraq. Steve.

KORNACKI: Foreign correspondent Ayman Mohyeldin in northern Iraq this morning. I appreciate that. And coming up in the next hour, more on the situation in Iraq including today`s blame game about what caused the current crisis. We`ll be talking with General Wesley Clark who led the war in Kosovo as NATO supreme allied commander. We`ll be talking to him about all of that.

We want to turn now to one of the violent scenes that unfolded this week here in the United States. This is what it looked like at Reynolds High School in the suburbs of Portland, Oregon, on Tuesday morning. Distraught students were filing out of school after a freshman student there shot and killed his 14-year-old classmate, Emilio Hoffman, in the boys` locker room. He also wounded a phys.ed teacher who tried to intervene and he turned the gun on himself after exchanging gunfire with police officers at the scene. Police say the shooter was armed with an assault rifle, nine magazines of ammunition, a handgun and a knife. According to the gun safety group everytown.org, this marked the 74th school shooting since the tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, back in December 2012. Less than two years ago. That was the school shooting that was so horrific that in its wake there seemed to be consensus that Congress would surely do something in response. Everytown.org arrived at that number of 74 by counting incidents, in which a firearm was discharged inside a school building or on school grounds.

Tragedy at Reynolds High School on Tuesday followed another horrific incident last week in Las Vegas. It`s where a husband and wife who espoused anti-government and anti-law enforcement beliefs gunned down and killed two police officers who were having lunch at a local pizzeria. The couple, who were videotaped at Cliven Bundy`s ranch in Nevada then fled to a nearby Walmart where they shot and killed the shopper. Police killed the husband and the wife then shot and killed herself. Firefight with police killed the husband who was a convicted felon and who was prohibited from purchasing guns. And the wife then shot and killed herself.

So those are just the mass shootings that happened in the last week. The day after that Las Vegas incident, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who represents Nevada, made his first unprompted mention of revisiting gun control legislation in months.

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SEN. HARRY REID (D) NEVADA, SENATE MAJORITY LEADER: A step in the right direction, universal background checks so that people who are criminals, who are deranged, can`t buy a gun. The American people are depending upon us to pass legislation to prevent gun violence and safeguard communities, schools and families.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KORNACKI: On Tuesday afternoon President Obama said the single biggest frustration of his presidency has been the lack of willingness to take basic steps to keep guns out of the hands of dangerous people.

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BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: We`re the only developed country on earth where this happens. And it happens now once a week. Our levels of gun violence are off the charts. There`s no advanced developed country on earth that would put up with this.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KORNACKI: But the president also expressed pessimism about getting gun legislation through Congress any time soon.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: And most members of Congress, and I have to say to some degree this is bipartisan, are terrified of the NRA. The combination of the NRA and gun manufacturers are very well financed and had the capacity to move votes in local elections and congressional elections, and so if you`re running for office right now, that`s where you feel the heat. And people on the other side may be generally favorable towards things like background checks and other common sense rules, but they`re not as motivated. But until that`s a view that people feel passionately about and are willing to go after, folks who don`t vote reflecting those values, until that happens, sadly not that much is going to change.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KORNACKI: It`s not that Congress entirely ignored what happened this week. On Tuesday the House held what was described as an emotional moment of silence for the victims in Portland. It was led by Oregon Democrat Earl Blumenauer whose district includes Reynolds High School. But absent any legislative action from Congress, this is how one Oklahoma company is trying to protect kids while they`re at school.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The Sandy Hook school massacre was a wake-up call for Steve Walker, a father of two elementary school students. Steve desperately wanted to protect his boys from a dangerous classroom intruder.

STEVE WALKER: We wanted to have our children and have a layer of protection that they could get immediately. So they would be stored in the classroom. And when seconds count, that they can be easily applied.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It took him a year to design, create and now market the bodyguard blanket. It`s made from the same material protecting police officers and our soldiers in Afghanistan. Kids put them on just like a backpack with head to toe defense.

WALKER: As the students put them on and they line up in the hallway, they develop like a (INAUDIBLE) shield like the Romans and the Greeks used to lock their shields together so it gives them added protection.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KORNACKI: Reports like that leave us to ask even in our polarized political environment, are bulletproof blankets really the best we can do to prevent future school shootings? To talk about this I want to bring in Pia Carusone, she`s executive director of the gun safety group, Americans for Responsible Solutions, that`s Gabby Giffords` group and Richard Feldman, he`s the president of the independent Firearm Owners Association, he`s also a former NRA lobbyist. So, thank you to both of you for joining us. And, you know, we have a little time here. Let`s try to find maybe - maybe some common ground. But Pia, I`ll start with you because it sounded to me in the extended clip we played from the president, earlier this week, it almost sounded to me like he was talking to you because it`s kind of striking to groups like yours. Because it`s kind of striking, a lot of times as White House you think of like the issue of immigration and the prospects of anything happening legislatively on immigration are not that good, but they talk like they are. They sort of keep the appearance and maybe even the illusion out there. When it comes to gun control legislation, though, he`s basically saying, no, look, it`s not happening and he`s putting the onus on you. And he`s saying I need groups to go out there and to make this issue matter to people who want gun control as much as it matters to the NRA. And when that happens, when there`s some parity there, then something can happen in Congress. So, what`s your response to the president when he says that?

PIA CARUSONE, AMERICANS FOR RESPONSIBLE SOLUTIONS: We completely agree. This issue is now political and we need to be able to show the senators that voted for background checks that you can both do the right thing and come back to work. And the folks in the House that have co-sponsored, you know, various bills similar to the background check bill that it`s possible to be both courageous and successful politically. So our group announced a couple of weeks ago that we`re getting involved in 11 races. We`ve raised at least over $14 million that we`ve publicly declared. We`re going to spend real money.

KORNACKI: So when you say these races, these are people ....

CARUSONE: These are elections, they are mostly incumbents that we`re going to be supporting this year. People that have stood up, shown the American public that they`re willing to do the right thing.

KORNACKI: Specifically on background checks?

CARUSONE: On background checks, exactly

KORNACKI: OK, now, let`s look at the question of background checks. Because it`s, you know, there`s all sorts of angles you could look legislatively in terms of what you can do on guns.

CARUSONE: Yes.

KORNACKI: But what the focus in Washington has been the Manchin-Toomey background checks bill introduced in the wake of Sandy Hook. We are still talking - Harry Reid is still talking about. So, tell us, we have right now going back 20 years to when the Brady Bill passed in the early `90s, there is a background check system in place right now. What is it specifically that Manchin-Toomey would do that doesn`t exist right now?

CARUSONE: So, Manchin-Toomey would have mandated background checks to occur at sales at gun shows and on the Internet, but it left open many exceptions for family members, for temporary transfers for hunting, it was a very reasonable bill. It was not even universal background checks, it was just expanding the current system that we have today that applies only to guns bought from licensed dealers.

KORNACKI: So the main thing you`re talking about here is Internet sales.

CARUSONE: And gun shows.

KORNACKI: And gun shows. OK.

CARUSONE: So, now Richard, I said I`m saying we can find some common ground here. And I`m curious what you make of specifically Manchin-Toomey. You know, we`re not talking about -- we`re talking specifically essentially bout background checks here, closing the loopholes that Pia just talked about. Is that something you find acceptable?

RICHARD FELDMAN, PRES. OF INDEPENDENT FIREARMS OWNERS ASSOCIATION: Our organization enthusiastically supported the final version of the Manchin-Toomey bill because it required background checks essentially in commercial transactions, not between people who know each other. That`s the objection gun folks have to the universal background check. When you`re buying and selling a gun in a commercial transaction at a gun show, we think it makes a lot of sense to require a background check, but that wouldn`t have had any impact on the recent high visibility crimes. Our shooter in Santa Barbara went through a background check. Nothing that`s been proposed would have had him in the system. Clearly he was disturbed. Clearly his parents tried to get help for him. They sent the police. But we have a failed mental health system in this country and we`re not really focusing on the problem that we could do something about.

KORNACKI: Richard, I want to get into the mental health question here in a minute, too, but I kind of want to stay on this point because it`s interesting. We have you and we have Pia agreeing and you are saying, you know, you both support the Manchin-Toomey background checks bill. And yet, in the wake of Sandy Hook and in the wake of -- I understand you can look at individual tragedies and say it wouldn`t have worked in this case, maybe it would have worked in this case. But putting that aside in the face of all of these tragedies that seem to keep happening, something is where there`s an agreement between the two of you cannot get through Congress right now. What is the obstacle? You say it`s reasonable. You`re a strong supporter of gun rights. You say it`s reasonable, Pia says it`s reasonable. What`s the obstacle here?

FELDMAN: The obstacle was that it got thrown together with all sorts of other provisions from Senator Dianne Feinstein on assault weapons. And while they were separate bills, in the minds of gun owners it was all one piece of legislation and the opposition to the assault weapons provisions overrode everything else. If we focused our attentions in this country on one aspect of the problem, as you`re trying to do right here and now, Pia and I would agree on solving this problem. Why don`t we act like we used to in America and take these issues one step at a time. Let`s not allow the things we disagree over prevent us from moving forward on the many areas that we do agree about.

KORNACKI: OK, so when we have found agreement on this bill, you just heard, Pia, Richard`s assessment of why it failed. What is your assessment?

CARUSONE: Yeah, I mean I think that these senators just couldn`t accept the fact that they were going to be doing something that the NRA would not be supportive of. And many of them have been working with the NRA their whole career and they couldn`t fathom a re-election where they weren`t endorsed by them, frankly.

KORNACKI: OK, there`s a piece of video here and we`ve got to squeeze a break in. But there`s a piece of video here, I think people have watched this in the last few weeks. And see, it`s incredibly emotional from the father of one of the recent victims. I want to play what he said and I want to have our two guests respond to that. We`ll do that when we come back.

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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RICHARD MARTINEZ, FATHER OF SHOOTING VICTIM: Why did Chris die? Chris died because of craven, irresponsible politicians and the NRA. They talk about gun rights. What about Chris`s right to live? When will this insanity stop? When will enough people say "Stop this madness, we don`t have to live like this." Too many have died! We should say to ourselves not one more.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KORNACKI: That was Richard Martinez. He was talking about his son, Chris, who was gunned down last month at U.C. Santa Barbara. And so, Richard, I just - I`m sure you`ve seen that clip before and I think a lot of people out there have seen it and have very, you know, strong reactions to it. When you hear that, the anguish of a father who just lost his son saying what he`s saying there, what kind of reaction do you have when you hear that?

FELDMAN: Well, it`s very understandable, but as a society we can`t respond to the momentary emotion. We need to take an intelligent, articulate, cool, calculated understanding of the problem and deal with the problem, not the emotionalism of the problem. And if we look at the behavioral indicators that surround the mentally deranged individual, we can do a lot to keep those guns hopefully out of the hands of some of them. We`ll probably prevent more suicides than we will mass homicides. We can do a better job. But if we look for perfection, we`re going to fail. There are lots of things we can do.

KORNACKI: So what, for example, what would you say? What would the prescription be?

FELDMAN: Well, maybe we need to take a better look at when the police are called to a situation, where the parents are concerned, maybe we should do more about the guns at that momentary moment when the police have been called in and they are aware, which they weren`t in Santa Barbara, that the person has guns. We need to take a very hard and careful look at what we can do in society in those moments of strife and anguish about keeping the guns away from someone in a situation like that shooter.

KORNACKI: So, Pia, so he seems to be suggesting there some sort of your mental health assessment and if somebody is found, you know, boy, this could be a concern here, then look at it, you know, should this person be owning firearms, should they have access to them in the first place, should he be owning them?

CARUSONE: Yes.

KORNACKI: When you hear what this father -- when you heard that reaction and you think in terms of what can we do, what kind of reaction do you have?

CARUSONE: Well, I mean it`s very difficult. Every situation is different. And in the case of the Las Vegas incident, when you saw people that were being manipulated by the rhetoric that they have heard in the media or that they have read and they have, you know, had this anti-government sentiment. In the California shooting, yes, he had guns, but like who would have known he had guns? No one wants registration. You start talking about that and, you know, you`ve got no support. So, you know, our perch - is we can agree, and, by the way, background checks is not controversial except in Washington, D.C. And we just did some polling in Texas, we found 75 percent of NRA members in Texas support background checks. If we can agree on that, let`s get that done and let that be the first step towards us having a conversation about really what else can we do, because the rest of it does get complicated. I mean, you know, talking about dangerously mentally ill people, how do you prevent them from causing harm to themselves and others, but not stigmatizing other people with mental health issues. How do you start to look at, you know, the lethality of weapons without limiting the responsible gun owners` rights? I mean it gets complicated. But, you know ...

KORNACKI: And Richard, is that what the NRA is afraid of here? When you look at something like background checks and you look at something like Manchin-Toomey and all of these sort of (INAUDIBLE) that have been put into it, is that ultimately what it comes down to from the NRA`s standpoint that they can`t let, quote unquote, the other side put a win on the board? Because if they put one win on the board, they say, well, and that means, you know, the next thing is going to be, you know, the sort of the myth of the NRA as all powerful thing gets chipped away? It`s easier to do something else. Is that what the NRA is really afraid of here, sort of that cascading effect?

FELDMAN: Well, that may be part of it. And, of course, the NRA is composed of four plus million Americans. And they have to be concerned about the views of their membership. But the NRA over the years has been a lot more responsible on the gun issue than is often given credit. They were involved very deeply in the original Brady law. In fact, the law that`s on the books today was written at the National Rifle Association. I know, because I was there at the time.

KORNACKI: But I mean do you want them -- do you want them right now - I mean you`ve been there. Do you look at them right now and say, hey, guys, listen, you`ve got to be a little reasonable here. Manchin-Toomey, you`ve got to, you know, get behind this one. Do you want them to get behind this one?

FELDMAN: Well, the earlier version of the Manchin-Toomey bill was very flawed. It was only the amended version which came up late in the day that we supported and, of course, you`ll have to ask NRA where they are. But there are aspects of the bill I don`t think they`d find objectionable and there was quite a bit in the bill that was very supportive of gun owners. But if we keep ourselves focused on the problem narrowly and carefully and always remember that it`s never the gun per se, but always in whose hands are the guns, and we articulate the discussion that way, we can thread the needle and move this debate to some resolution.

KORNACKI: All right, well, It`s been a year and a half since Sandy Hook, and again at that moment I think if you`d said a year and a half later nothing would have happened, I think people would have been very surprised but here we are. This is the thing still that`s in the air. Will Manchin-Toomey - will background checks ever actually become law? That`s the question. My thanks to Pia Carusone with the group Americans for Responsible Solutions, Richard Feldman from the Independent Firearm Owners Association. Eric Cantor wasn`t the only stunning political story out of Virginia this week. There`s another one, we`ll tell you about it. That`s next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KORNACKI: As Virginia Republicans take a hard turn to the right, voting out Majority Leader Eric Cantor in that stunning primary upset this week as well as nominating extremely conservative candidates like former Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli and E.W. Jackson last year, as all of that happens, the state`s current Democratic governor, Terry McAuliffe, is staking his entire legislative agenda, his entire governorship on one of the biggest political lightning rods of the last five years. The Affordable Care Act. It has been the sole mission of McAuliffe`s governorship to pass Medicaid expansion in the commonwealth of Virginia. An effort that would extend health care to 400,000 low income residents in that state. It was this expansion that met the resistance of his predecessor, Republican Governor Bob McDonnell, Republican governors all around the country. But when Democrats swept last November`s election, recapturing the governorship, the lieutenant governor`s office, it looked like the Medicaid expansion was going to happen. It put Democrats in control of the state senate while leaving the statehouse, though, in Republican hands. Virginia is the only state that Obama won in 2012 where a Democratic governor has not been able to expand Medicaid yet. It is the outlier blue state in that way. And with Democrats in power across the board, it looked like Virginia might finally be able to get that legislation passed this year. McAuliffe wanted the Medicaid expansion in the state`s budgets, something they put together only once every two years but the Republican House fiercely opposed his efforts. They proposed separating the two, McAuliffe wouldn`t budge, the legislature ended its session without passing a budget in March. So McAuliffe has been taking his campaign for Medicaid expansion on the road. He went to communities like Martinsville near the North Carolina border, a region with the state`s highest unemployment rate. McAuliffe visited health care centers run by Piedmont Access to Health Services, which estimates that nearly half of their 12,000 patients would qualify for health insurance under the Medicaid expansion. Expansion would help them see more patients, some of whom McAuliffe heard from directly.

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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Where do I draw the line? Do I not eat? Do I not by a medication? Do I not pay a bill? Because I was one of those that now do not exist, but I was once a middle class citizen.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KORNACKI: So that was the backdrop this week when the legislature came back into session. They were going to settle the Medicaid dispute. The state government would shut down by the end of the month if they didn`t, and Democrats appeared to hold all of the cards, or most of the cards. But on Sunday night "The Washington Post" learned that a Democratic state senator, Phillip Puckett, was going to resign his seat, handing control of the chamber to Republicans. In exchange his daughter would get a judgeship and Puckett himself would be rewarded with a job with the state tobacco commission. The alleged quid pro quo certainly has been denied by the parties, but the alleged quid pro quo prompted an outcry from Democrats, leading Puckett to withdraw his name from consideration for the tobacco commission job. The damage was done. The state senate was now in Republican hands and the united Republican legislature was poised to sever Medicaid from the budget, which they did late Thursday night along with an amendment requiring the general assembly`s authorization of any increased spending on Medicaid. So now Governor McAuliffe is weighing his next steps. He`s crafting a strategy to bring the Medicaid expansion he promised to Virginia in spite of these new hurdles. The 400,000 Virginians who would have received health care under the expansion, they remain uninsured. For now anyway, joining us now is the Democratic Lieutenant Governor of Virginia, Ralph Northam. He`s a former member of the state senate.

Mr. Lieutenant Governor, thank you for Joining us this morning. So look, give us the bottom line on this. I mean this is - this is what Terry McAuliffe ran on, this is sort of the signature pledge of his governorship. I am going to expand Medicaid. We`re going to be that another one of these blue states that gets it. The Republicans now have forced this budget on him that does not include that. What happens next?

LT. GOV. RALPH NORTHAM, (D) VIRGINIA: Well, Steve, good morning. And we were able to pass a budget Thursday night, but disappointingly there are 400,000 Virginians now, hard-working Virginians without coverage. And as we know when one doesn`t have coverage, they end up receiving the care in the emergency room. There`s a time and a place for the emergency room, but it`s certainly not an effective and an efficient place for care. So we`re going to continue to move forward with Medicaid expansion and hopefully in a bipartisan manner. The other thing, Steve, that is important for folks to realize, we are losing right now in the commonwealth of Virginia $5.2 million a day. To date we have left $827 million on the table. And as a business model, it just doesn`t make sense for the commonwealth of Virginia.

KORNACKI: When you say you`re going to move forward, I mean the reports are saying some kind of executive action. Is that what you`re saying? Do you expect Governor McAuliffe to take executive action on this to implement it on his own without the legislature?

NORTHAM: Well, certainly he`s looking at his options right now. We were disappointed on Thursday night. We came into Richmond intending to pass the budget, intending to provide coverage for these 400,000 individuals. We don`t have that presently, but there are some options. He`s looking into them. He can sign the bill, he can amend it, he can veto it. So we`re sitting down as a group and in the next seven days we`re going to make an important decision. But the bottom line is, it is very, very important for these 400,000 individuals to have coverage. And it`s also important economically for Virginia to move forward with Medicaid expansion.

KORNACKI: Well, this is - here`s the quote because I mean certainly the expectation now of some kind of executive action or at least the possibility of executive action is leading to some criticism from Republicans. This is a member of the House of Delegates, a Republican who said of the possible executive action. It would be unconstitutional and he, Terry McAuliffe, would be putting himself in a very precarious situation both legally and, more importantly, with his relationship with the general assembly. He`s raising two issues there. Let me just take the legal one. Have you looked at this and are you satisfied that there is a legal route to expanding this by executive action?

NORTHAM: Well, we`re looking at that, Steve, but certainly we would like to do this through the legislature. That`s the way it should be done. You know, as you said earlier, we ran on this issue in Virginia. Our Attorney General Mark Herring and myself and Governor McAuliffe, we won. The people spoke in the commonwealth of Virginia. They are supportive of closing the coverage gap. So we need to do what the people want to do in Virginia and that`s move forward with Medicaid expansion.

KORNACKI: Just a quick follow-up. Is there a case to be made for, you know, rejecting the budget and putting this back and saying, hey, look, I`m only signing a budget with Medicaid expansion because that`s what the people want and Republicans aren`t giving it to them. And we`re not going to have a budget till they do that. Is there a case to be made for that?

NORTHAM: Well, certainly time is a factor, Steve. And, you know, we need a budget in place by July 1 and here we are in the middle of June, so we don`t have a lot of time to work on that. So priority number one, certainly, is to have a budget in Virginia that we can all work with. The localities rely on that. But we want to move forward with Medicaid expansion as well so we`re working on those options presently.

KORNACKI: All right, so to be continue - the story. My thanks to Virginia Lieutenant Governor Ralph Northam. There is more on how Medicaid expansion is playing out all across the country. We`ll talk to two people who know it very well. That`s next.

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GOV. TERRY MCAULIFFE (D), VIRGINIA: A bipartisan coalition of Democrats and Republicans, business groups and hospitals have said that we need to accept the Medicaid expansion and bring Virginia`s taxpayer money back to Virginia.

(APPLAUSE)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KORNACKI: That was Terry McAuliffe on election night back in November talking about the clearest difference he had with his Republican opponent. He has yet to get it through the state legislature that suffered a major setback this week. Here to discuss the expansion of Medicaid, a pillar of Obamacare, the Affordable Care Act and its broader implications, we have Annie Lowrey, she`s an economics policy reporter from the "New York Times" and NBC senior political reporter Perry Bacon Jr. He joins us -- both of them join us from Washington, D.C., this morning. Perry, I`ll start with you. You wrote about this Virginia question this week. We just had the lieutenant governor on. He wasn`t really committing to anything as best I could tell, he just said we`re going to look at it, we`re going to look at it. But you`ve been looking at this. Is this where you expect things to go right now, is there going to be an executive action by Terry McAuliffe in Virginia to expand Medicaid?

PERRY BACON JR., NBC NEWS CORRESPONDENT: I don`t think there will be, Steve. What happened this week really changed the dynamic, particularly what happened on Thursday? The Republicans got even more power in the legislature because of that resignation. And what they did is they passed a provision that said basically, no matter what the governor has to get our approval to expand Medicaid. Not just funding, because the actual funding dollars come from the federal government for Medicaid right now, so there`s no money the legislature has to give, but they have passed a provision that says he cannot do anything unless we approve it. And now the budget is in his hands and he has two options, veto the budget or sign - veto the budget, lead to a government shutdown potentially or sign this thing. There are 68 members of the house of delegates that are Republicans and only 31 Democrats in the House of Delegates in Virginia. It`s hard to see them moving. It looks more like McAuliffe is going to lose this issue for right now.

KORNACKI: Right. And that is the one thing I did think was clear from the lieutenant governor there, it did not sound like shutting down the government and rejecting the budget was a possibility for them. So, Annie, look at this, if what Perry is saying is right, and the Republicans are going to win this round. They have fought Terry McAuliffe on his signature goal in Virginia and it looks like for the moment, they`re going to win. There is not going to be Medicaid expansion in the state of Virginia. And if there`s no executive action, then that`s it, at least, you know, for the foreseeable future. When you look back two years ago at that Supreme Court ruling that basically said this is the state`s call whether to expand Obamacare this way, did you think two years later we would be talking about all these states that haven`t done it? We`d be talking about a state like Virginia having a fight like this to not do it?

ANNIE LOWREY: Yeah, absolutely. And the Supreme Court ruling, which was surprising, basically the Obama administration thought that it would be able to compel states to join the expansion and it also thought that states -- it gave states a really good deal. They`re going to pay 90 percent of the cost in perpetuity and it`s I think 100 percent of the cost for the first three years. But if you look back to previous expansions of benefits like this, very often when states had the option to do it, so including Medicare, it took a lot of - a long time for some states to go around. So currently it`s 27 states and the District of Columbia that have accepted the Medicaid expansion. About five other states are currently looking close at it. Are thinking about expanding. And I think that it`s just going to take a long time before you start to see the really deep red states perhaps considering this legislatively.

KORNACKI: Yeah, so it will take some time, I guess, but you look at like in Ohio, Kasich, the Republican governor, he`s gone to great lengths to do expansion there. You`ve seen versions of it elsewhere. But so a state like Virginia, a deep red state like you see throughout the South, it`s going to take time and what else? What is going to happen in that time that is going to make Republican governors and Republican legislatures say, yeah, we need to do this? What do you think the key is on that front?

LOWREY: Well, I think that it`s important to note that you have red states that have already done this. So, look at Arkansas, which, you know, is not a state that is very Democratic, but they have gone ahead, they`ve done it. The legislature kind of held their nose, but said that they thought that it would be the best thing to do. I think that you`re going to have to look at whether the program succeeds in states like that to help create some political space for other really deep red states to do this. But frankly, I think it`s going to be a long time before you see states like South Carolina, states like Texas actually go ahead and accept it because I think that it just - you know, it`s not within the realm of political possibility currently, but I think it will take a long time to get there. And more red states going ahead and doing it. I think it`s what you`re going to need.

KORNACKI: Yeah, no, I mean I`ve been wondering if the key date isn`t January 21st, 2017, President Obama is no longer in office and maybe stop being called Obamacare. We`ll see. But I want to thank Annie Lowrey from "The New York Times" and NBC`s Perry Bacon Jr.

He may be the last person you would expect to speak at a high profile retreat for prominent Republicans. We will speak to the Democrat who`s dropped hints of a run for president. We`ll talk to him live when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KORNACKI: Some of the country`s most influential Republicans spent part of this weekend in Park City, Utah. They have Mitt Romney to thank for it. They were there for a retreat organized by the former GOP presidential nominee. Lots of 2016 presidential hopefuls were in attendance, including New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, Kentucky Senator Rand Paul, Wisconsin Congressman Paul Ryan. He was the 2012 VP nominee with Romney, of course. You may be surprised to hear that this man was there too. It`s former Montana governor Brian Schweitzer. He`s a Democrat. There`s plenty of buzz that he may be thinking of running for the Democratic presidential domination. According to "The New York Times" Schweitzer jokes that, quote, "There`s not a single vote for me in the building." "Times" claims that Romney then took a shot at the media by saying Schweitzer would find some votes in the pressroom. Looks like Schweitzer wasn`t the only Democrat Romney wanted at the retreat political as reporting that he also invited Hillary Clinton. She`s, of course, in the middle of her book tour and couldn`t make it to Utah this weekend. At the retreat Romney didn`t have kind words about Clinton`s tenure as Secretary of State. He said that "The Obama, Biden, Hillary Clinton foreign policy is a monumental bust." And he weighed in on the current crisis in Iraq saying "tragically we fought in Iraq, all the 4500 American lives lost is on the cusp of potentially vanishing." Brian Schweitzer is back in Montana this morning from his trip to Park City. He joins us now live. And governor, thanks for taking the time. So, look, I mean, you know, the stories are all out there that maybe Brian Schweitzer is interested in running for president in 2016 and here you are talking to a roomful of rich Republicans organized by Mitt Romney in Utah. How did that come about?

FMR. GOV. BRIAN SCHWEITZER (D) MONTANA: Well, Mitt called and said, look, Brian, I do this thing every year and many of these people are my donors and I`d like you to come down and give them the Democratic perspective. And so I did. And I`ve got to tell you, this was something. It was a little bit like a boxing ring, so there was a small ring in the middle and then there were raised seats around it with these 300 people. And in the middle of my presentation, I kind of thought about the gladiators who were out there and having the fans all cheer for the tiger. It was a -- they were -- they were not that receptive, but listen, I told them things like this. You don`t like Obamacare. You know, I had some concerns with it, too, because I wanted a single payer, which would be more efficient. Well, they didn`t boo me on that one. I said to them, no, let`s not talk about going back into Iraq, because it was a mistake to go there the first time. I told them, look, I lived in the Middle East for seven years. Iraq was fighting Iran. Iraq was maintaining Iran`s - sort of holding Iran in check. And then when we attacked Iraq, we took out Saddam Hussein, we created that vacuum and now we have a problem. I told them the solution is not to go back to the Middle East. The solution is a cleaner and greener American supply of energy, so we`ll never have to fight another oil war. We`ll never send our sons and daughters to fight for those dictators again and they can boil in their own oil.

KORNACKI: Let me ask you what you think the purpose of the conference was, because there`s been a lot of reporting that`s come out of this and a lot of people who have been there at this thing talking about Mitt Romney in 2016, believe it or not. You even were quoted as saying that looking at the Republican 2016 field, Mitt Romney would be a giant among midgets. Did you get this - did you get this sense being at this thing, talking to him, listening to the donors there, did you get the sense that he`s thinking about 2016 at all?

SCHWEITZER: Mitt is not running. And I talked to some of his family. And they said the same things that my family say to me, which is they don`t want to go through this again. They do not want to have their father, their husband, involved in this again. Mitt, I guess, feels a responsibility, to, in particular these donors to continue in the process. But I don`t believe Mitt Romney. He said he`s not running for president. I believe him. But what was interesting about this is I got an opportunity to see Republicans talking about policy among themselves. And they had a panel just before I spoke. And it was a group of women saying to them, are you crazy? You`ve got to have immigration policy or you`re not going to have people of color ever support you. And they said, well, you know, and you`ve got to do something about gay marriage, because gays, lesbians, transgenders, they`re in every family in America. And people that are 30 and under, they`re never going to vote for you old white guys if you don`t support these issues. And so it was kind of interesting hearing from their own perspective about what their fatal flaws are.

KORNACKI: You are - well, speaking of fatal flaws, a lot of people in 2012 looked at Mitt Romney and said he could be his own worst enemy in some ways, but you made a little news here, too. This was a quote. Tell me if they got this right, but this is how you were quoted in "The Washington Post" of this thing. You were saying - you said to Romney I don`t know why you lost the election, Mitt, but I know this. I was watching you on TV and I didn`t see the Mitt Romney that I knew. You`re a fun guy, you`re easy going and Obama is not. I`ve been in the room with him a little too. He`s stiff as a board and you`ve got it going on. You think Obama is stiff as a board?

SCHWEITZER: Sure. When Obama has a great persona in front of people. But he`s - you know, listen, we all know that. He`s cold, he`s cool, he`s collected. And some of those are the characteristics that you want in a president. Somebody who when they get that call in the middle of the night says, all right, I understand, I got it as opposed to somebody who flies off the handle. Mitt Romney, he was stiff on television. I think we can all agree. But when he was in with the group of people that he knows, he was cracking jokes, he was fluid, he wasn`t that stiff guy that was walking on stage. So what happens in these presidential elections, that was - Republicans and Democrats. The question.

(CROSSTALK)

SCHWEITZER: Is that they get so handled, that they get stiff.

KORNACKI: Well, so, OK now the question too, that response that I just read back to you, it was in response to a question saying are you, Brian Schweitzer, more relatable than Hillary Clinton and you told the crowd, yes. You think you are more relatable than Hillary Clinton.

SCHWEITZER: I did not. Actually let me tell you what the question was. The question was this. Did you hear that Hillary Clinton said she was flat broke? And then the second part of it, are you relatable to people? And on the first one I said, no, wait, there was more that Hillary said. Hillary said, look, when we left office, we had millions of dollars` worth of legal fees and we didn`t have jobs. And so -- and she`s also said well, maybe I misspoke by saying we were flat broke. But the facts are that they had - they had debts and they had very few assets. And the second part of it about reliability, I said, well, I don`t really know how to answer that question other than to say I`m related to a lot of people. I have 69 first cousins. That was the only answer that I gave.

KORNACKI: But you also - I want to get one more question because you also said in another quote that I read, it was, you said I`ll tell you one thing, I wouldn`t have voted for that damn war talking about Iraq, talking about 2002, talking about the vote that Hillary Clinton cast as a member of the Senate in 2002. She`s one of the pieces of news she`s made with this book tour she`s on right now, saying she got it wrong on Iraq. Acknowledging she got it wrong on Iraq. Is that good enough for you do you think - she still have questions to answer about that?

SCHWEITZER: No. Listen, everybody has made mistakes and everybody moves on. I didn`t mention the name Hillary Clinton or anybody else during my comments other than Rand Paul, who I said I agreed with on NSA. And I disagreed with the Bush administration on the Patriot Act that allowed us to spy on our own citizens. I disagreed with the real I.D., and I told those folks that. So, the bottom line is, a lot of people supported that last war in Iraq. The question is now, are we going to throw more money and more lives in Iraq and the Middle East or are we going to develop an energy future in America so we`ll never fight another oil war?

KORNACKI: Well, when you are putting out signs you might be interested in running for president against Hillary Clinton, you say I wouldn`t have voted for that war in `02, I think people are going to make the connection and say I think he`s not to be talking about Hillary there. But anyway. Brian Schweitzer, former governor of Montana and attendee at the - very interesting, Mitt Romney - thank you for taking a few minutes to tell us about it. I appreciate it. And we`ll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KORNACKI: Everyone and everything, it seems, has a Facebook page these days, including the aircraft carrier, the USS George H.W. Bush. And on that page you can find this photo of how the crew of the USS George H.W. Bush chose to extend their namesake a birthday wish on Thursday. The men and women that work the flight deck in their brightening color uniform spelled out 41 equals 90. And then only two days later the carrier received orders to head to the Persian Gulf for the possibility of military intervention in Iraq. USS George H.W. Bush is on its way there right now and General Wesley Clark, who commanded U.S. forces in Kosovo, is joining us live to talk about that next.

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KORNACKI: Another day of intense fighting across Iraq as President Obama weighs his options for possible military intervention. The Defense Secretary is taking steps to make sure the U.S. military can carry out those options. The Pentagon announced yesterday that Secretary Chuck Hagel has ordered an aircraft carrier to escort ships to the Persian Gulf. Ships carry Tomahawk missiles that have the capability to reach Iraq. The aircraft carrier, the George H.W. Bush carries fighter jets that can also easily make it to Iraq. Thousands of Shiite men from across southern Iraq are answering an urgent call to arms today. Hundreds of them set off from Basra this morning for training before joining in the fight. There are reports this morning that a number of towns had been retaken from the rebels, but that the al Qaeda-inspired insurgents still hold the big cities of Tikrit and Mosul. For nearly a decade the city of Basra served as the headquarters for the British forces that aided the U.S. And this morning former British Prime Minister Tony Blair who made that decision to join the U.S. more than a decade ago, he is saying that the 2003 invasion is not the cause for the violence happening in Iraq right now. Blair points the finger of blame largely at the ongoing crisis in Syria, adding that the idea Iraq would still be stable today under Saddam Hussein is, quote, "simply not credible and bizarre."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TONY BLAIR, FMR. U.K. PRIME MINISTER: Even if you left Saddam in place in 2003, then when 2011 happened and you had the Arab revolutions going through Tunisia and Libya and Yemen and Bahrain and Egypt and Syria, you would have still had a major problem in Iraq. You can see what happens when you leave the dictator in place, as has happened with Assad now. The problems don`t go away.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KORNACKI: Joining me this morning from Little Rock, Arkansas, to talk about all of this, we have retired U.S. Army General Wesley Clark, he`s a former supreme allied commander with NATO who ran for president as a Democrat in 2004. General, welcome, thank you for joining us this morning.

GEN. WESLEY CLARK, FMR. U.S. ARMY (RET.): Thank you, Steve.

KORNACKI: I guess I just want to start with your response to what we just heard Tony Blair saying right there. He`s saying that, you know, in 2003 Saddam Hussein is deposed, Saddam Hussein, you know, Sunni, now we have the sort of this radical Sunni insurgency. He`s saying that none of the destabilizing effects of 2003 account for this. He`s saying it`s the uprising in 2011, that`s what we can point the finger at. What do you make of that argument?

CLARK: Well, I think that there`s some truth in that argument and that the proximate cause of this is that all of these insurgents have been trained in the Syrian conflict. But I think if you go back and look at it, you`ll find that the U.S. invasion of Iraq actually served as a focal point, which built up the resistance in Iraq. It drew in terrorists and wannabe terrorists from all over the world. They practiced, they worked against the United States, they sparked the Sunni/Shia conflict that emerged there. So I think it`s more like a 70-30. 70 percent of it back on what happened in Iraq 2003, 2007, 2008, and then 30 percent on what`s happening now.

KORNACKI: Let`s talk about what`s happening now and where this is going from the standpoint of the U.S. military. We have the reports of the USS George H.W. Bush being sent to the Persian Gulf. We have the president sort of weighing all of his options right now. We have John Kerry saying yesterday, apparently, that the U.S. will stand with, you know, the Iraqi government. When you look at everything that`s happening right now, you`ve been in situations, you know, sort of similar to this before. When you look at what`s happening right now, the signals that are being sent, what do you think the likelihood is of the U.S. intervening militarily in some way?

CLARK: I`d say it`s a 50-50 right now. But I think that it`s important to understand what the United States has tried to do under President Obama is extraordinarily difficult, to pull back from an intervention. When we did it in Vietnam, it was extremely difficult and painful and it was something we lived with for 20 years, really until the Gulf war. But when we are trying to do this and also handle the problems going on, you just can`t underestimate how difficult this is psychologically, politically, diplomatically and militarily. And so it`s an extraordinary time. Now, what`s happening today, as we`re going through these recalculations, is that you`re seeing nations in the region like Iran and Iraq recalculating. They`re saying, hmm, you know, maybe the United States does need to be here. We need American power. So in a way, this is an opportunity for the United States to reinsert itself on the right side in this conflict. We cannot permit -- we should not permit something like ISIS to control a large section of territory in the Middle East on a permanent basis. They are terrorists.

KORNACKI: So you favor some sort of intervention here. I guess that`s the question. I mean the case made for -- is it air strikes that you favor, first of all? Because there`s the issue here of everybody is saying no boots on the ground. I assume you`re talking about air strikes?

CLARK: Well, I think that what`s happening right now is that Iran is intervening, the Iraqis are getting their house in order, the Pesh Murga in Kurdistan has moved forward, so I think, ISIS will meet its own end. It may hold on to a small territory, small piece of territory in Iraq. It`s to the United States` advantage right now to come in, to go to Maliki, to say you`re going to have to restructure your government. President Obama has already said that. You`re going to have to have a different outlook on life. You can`t take a major part of your country like the Sunni population and not have them represented. You can`t brand their leaders as criminals. You`ve got to bring the country together. On that condition then and a condition of your at least Western orientation, then the United States, we, the United States, will support you. This is the moment for that kind of intervention. And then what we do militarily, that`s a matter of some skillful assessment by General Dempsey and the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

KORNACKI: You talk about the reconciliation there, though, basically, you`re saying, you know, to Maliki, you`ve got to reach out to the Sunnis, you`ve got to include them, you know, as they sort of were in the final years of the U.S. presence in Iraq, it seemed that was the trajectory, at least. But I look back now at the last decade or so and I wonder is that possible in Iraq? When you`re talking about these friction that goes back, you know, hundreds of years between these different groups, or tribal friction that takes place, and you`re saying, well, they`re all supposed to respect that this is - you know, they live in Iraq, the country of Iraq, and the country of Iraq was created, you know, basically a century ago in the wake of World War I. It`s almost artificial in that way. When you look at how deep this enmity is between all of these sides, can they ever really co-exist in a central government or are we just trying to put, you know, things together here that can`t stay together?

CLARK: Well, they may not stay together. I mean nothing stays together permanently, maybe, in human affairs. Nations change, boarders change, attitudes change. But the simple answer is, yes, Maliki can do more. He can bring the leaders in together. And instead of intensifying the sectarian divide and conflict, which is going to - attempting to sweep into the region, he can dampen it down. That is the role of Iraq. Iraq is a state. It was put together. It has Sunni and Shia and Kurds in it. And it could play a very constructive role in the region by working more harmoniously. It`s a question of whether the fault lines are emphasized or the unifying factors are emphasized.

KORNACKI: You -- obviously you have such an impressive military background, I just wonder when you think of the soldiers, when you think of the families, when you think of the lives that have been lost and the cost that individuals have paid on the United States` side for the last ten plus years in Iraq and you look at the cost that the entire country has paid and you look at what the conditions were like in Iraq before the invasion in 2003 and you look at what`s playing out right now, what would you say to the family of a fallen soldier in Iraq? What was it for? What have we gotten now that wasn`t in place before? Is it better in some meaningful way?

CLARK: I`m not sure that you weigh it that way. I think what you say is, you know, we love your children, your son, your daughter, their sacrifice. It was for the United States of America. We honor you and your family and their sacrifice. But I think when you go up and tout the costs and benefits, you`re on shaky ground in any conflict. You do what`s supposed to be done. This nation was 70 - 60, 70 percent in favor of the war in Iraq. The news media was pushing it. Lots of the political leaders were pushing it. 55 percent of the American public believed that Saddam Hussein was behind 9/11. Governmental leaders threatened mushroom clouds over American cities if we didn`t do something. So when you look at the hype at the time, you can hardly go back to the families and say you shouldn`t have allowed your son or daughter to enlist, that was a mistake. It wasn`t a mistake. They believed in this country. They trusted the leadership of this country to do the right thing. It turns out in retrospect it wasn`t the right thing. Some of us said that at the time. But that`s the Democratic process. And we love this country, we believe in the system we have in the United States of America, and those men and women who fought and died and were injured, they believed in that system, too. They served it and protected it and we honor them.

KORNACKI: All right. Retired General Wesley Clark, really appreciate the time this morning. Thank you, sir, for joining us.

And just when the Republican Party appeared to have figured out how to keep its incumbent members from being primaried out of the office by the Tea Party, as soon as it looked like they had a handle on that, Eric Cantor was defeated in one of the biggest upsets in history. So are there any other candidates who should be worried it could also happen to them? We will look at the sequel of the shocker we saw in Virginia this week. The potential sequel, that`s next.

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KORNACKI: In show business when a movie becomes a surprise smash hit at the box office, everybody starts asking, so when`s the sequel? In politics, when an entrenched well known and well-funded national leader suffers a shocking loss in a primary, everybody starts asking, so who`s the next one to go? Remember, Eric Cantor`s loss to Tea Party challenger David Brat in the Republican primary on Tuesday was merely the latest in a series of Tea Party upsets that have ended the careers of several major Republicans since 2010. Think of Dick Lugar, Mike Castle, Bob Bennett and others. Talk for much of the spring was the Tea Party fever was dying down in Republican primaries, that the establishment had cracked the code and figured out how to keep these upsets from happening again. But with Cantor going down, it`s now clear the danger for Republican incumbents in primaries hasn`t yet lifted. In the 2014 primary season isn`t over yet. So who might be next? We know that Thad Cochran, the six-term Republican from Mississippi tops the list of possible next Tea Party victims. He`s fighting for his political life in a runoff against state senator Chris McDaniel coming up on June 24th. But we`ve known Cochran is in trouble for a while now. What about the ones like Cantor, where it sneaks up on everyone? Here there are two Republicans who might be sweating a little bit after what happened this week in Virginia. One of them is Lamar Alexander. He is the second-term Republican from Tennessee, the former presidential contender. Alexander has a reputation for being somewhat pragmatic and has been in politics for decades. These are characteristics that he has in common with a lot of the Tea Party`s victims these last few years. He also represents a Southern state where the electorate is particularly conservative and where the Tea Party is particularly strong. Alexander is being challenged in a GOP primary by State Representative Joe Carr, who after Cantor lost this week blasted out a fundraising email with the message Lamar, you`re next. Carr was on CNBC this week and elaborated on that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE CARR: I think Senator Alexander has got a similar problem that leader Cantor had and that he`s out of touch with his Republican base in Tennessee.

KORNACKI: There`s no recent reliable polling on this race. Alexander`s campaign did put out an internal poll earlier this year claiming the senator leads Carr 62-17 percent, although remember, Eric Cantor`s campaign claimed they were up by 34 points and you saw what happened there this week. The Tennessee primary is on August 7. Lamar Alexander`s opponent says he should be very worried. Is that right? We`re going to ask Michael Collins, he`s the Washington correspondent with the Knoxville "New Sentinel." Michael, thanks for joining us. So, look, I mean we`re looking everywhere now to find after what happened to Eric Cantor, if that could sneak up and happen with nobody knowing it was coming, where else could it happen? And so I think it`s a little natural to look at Lamar Alexander, just given I think his longevity in politics, somebody he`s been a governor of Tennessee, somebody now going for, you know, another six years in the Senate, someone who`s been around for a while, has a reputation for being a bit pragmatic. Is there anything for him to worry about, do you think in this primary coming up in August?

MICHAEL COLLINS, KNOXVILLE, NEWS SENTINELL: Well, his opponent, Joe Carr, certainly would like for us to think that. But, you know, there are a lot of differences. Several key differences between Senator Alexander and Eric Cantor. The biggest one, I think, is that Senator Alexander has been around a long time. He is not going to make the same kind of mistakes, the same kind of fatal mistakes that Eric Cantor made. And what I`m thinking of is Eric Cantor spent a lot of time going across the country, raising money for other candidates, raising money for what everybody assumed was going to be his own campaign for speaker of the House. Senator Alexander is not going to have that distraction. He was a member of -- Senator Alexander was a member of Senate Republican leadership. He was the third ranking Republican. He was the chairman of the Senate Republican conference. He gave that seat up about three years ago because he said he wanted to concentrate on legislation. He wanted to be able to get things done. And so, he`s not going to have that distraction. He`s spending quite a bit of time in the state. He has ramped up his appearances in Tennessee recently. He`s not been really doing the traditional campaign kind of events that you see candidates do. He`s done some of those. New Jersey Governor Chris Christie was in -- at an event for him in the Memphis area a few weeks ago, and so he`s done some of those things. But what he has been doing mostly is going to Tennessee and doing the kinds of things that senators do. He`s been attending, you know, various events, fundraising -- campaign-style events and his campaign staff seems to think that as long as he is doing the kinds of things that voters sent him to Washington to do, then they will send him back to Washington for a third term.

KORNACKI: OK, Michael Collins in Knoxville "New Sentinel" says Lamar Alexander may be well positioned to avoid being the next candidate. We`ll find out in August when that primary happens. The other Republican who might be - thank you for joining us, by the way. The other Republican who might be a little nervous right now is Pat Roberts from Kansas. Like Alexander he has a reputation for being a little more pragmatic. He`s also been in Washington for a long time. 18 years in the Senate and 16 in the House before that, a total of 34 years. He also came under fire earlier this year when "The New York Times" reported that what he lists as his home address in Kansas is actually a house on a golf course that`s owned by two of his donors. Roberts, according to that report, pays them $300 a month and sleeps in the house, quote, occasionally. There`s a long tradition of intra party warfare within the Kansas GOP and Roberts is being challenged by Tea Party candidate Milton Wolf. He`s a radiologist who is also, believe it or not, Barack Obama`s second cousin once removed. Kansas primary is August 5th. Could Pat Roberts be the next candidate? To answer that, we`re joined by Dave Helling, he is a political reporter with "The Kansas City Star." So Dave, take it away. I mean Pat Roberts, 34 years in Washington, the Kansas Republican Party always seems to be fighting with each other. Could this one sneak up on people and surprise them?

DAVE HELLING, KANSAS CITY STAR: You`re right, Steve, by the way, Pat Roberts is a veteran of Washington. First went there in 1980 as a congressman. You know, we`re all trying to figure out a little bit what actually happened in Virginia to determine whether it is exportable to states like Kansas. And we`re not completely sure of that yet. I think every political reporter in America is going back to look at his or her notes to determine, you know, what have we missed, what are we not seeing? Having said that, it does not appear, as is the case in Tennessee, it does not appear at this moment that Pat Roberts is in serious trouble. There is a path for Milton Wolf, and it`s a path very much like you saw in Virginia where he gets sort of a crusade mentality going and the Tea Party really rises up to oppose Pat Roberts, but you don`t see that yet for a couple of reasons. First, Pat Roberts has gone hard right. He could make any Tea Partier blush in terms of his positions on issues. He voted against the Farm Bill, he voted against a spending bill in Kansas, he called on Kathleen Sebelius to resign when the Obamacare computer problems cropped up. So he`s been very aggressive moving to the right, not giving Milton Wolf room on that side. And then he`s locked up virtually every endorsement in the state. The Governor Sam Brownback, Tim Huelscamp, Kris Kobach, people who might naturally find themselves in the same camp with Milton Wolf have instead endorsed Pat Roberts. So, for those two reasons he`s still the favorite. But again, as we learn in Virginia, there is a path for the Tea Party candidate.

KORNACKI: Yeah, and very quickly, that golf course story, it just reminds me, it seems like the kind of thing, I remember with Lugar in Indiana in 2012. It was the .

HELLING: Right.

KORNACKI: He`s never really in the state anymore. He`s not one of us anymore. It seems like the kind of story that can get that going a little bit. Has that had any effect?

HELLING: Yeah, some. And it got Eric Cantor, as you know, in Virginia. You know, Kansans are a bit ambivalent, though, Steve. You know, let`s face it. Nobody thought Bob Dole really lived in Kansas either for 20, 25 years. So that in isolation might not make a difference. But, but if you can get the idea going that somehow he`s been out of touch not just in terms of where he lives, but what he`s done, then Milton Wolf has a chance. Now, the other thing that Milton Wolf needs is some money and some energy. You know, one of the things Eric Cantor had in Virginia was Laura Ingraham and talk radio. You don`t really get a sense of that here. I think that, you know, what we`ll be watching is Thad Cochran`s race in Mississippi. If the Tea Party candidate can win there and beat Cochran, who has some similarities with Roberts, then I do think national attention will turn to Kansas. Some money might come in, some more national Tea Party energy and again, that would help Milton Wolf as we head towards the August primary.

KORNACKI: OK, another one to keep an eye on. Thanks to Dave Helling with the "Kansas City Star." We appreciate that. Thanks for getting up this morning. The candidate whose defeat handed Ted Kennedy`s seat to Scott Brown, that candidate is on the verge of a comeback. Oh maybe until yesterday. It`s a big breaking news story. We`ll have all the details, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KORNACKI: Yesterday in the Netherlands, Argentina and England fought it out for third and fourth place in the Field Hockey World Cup. That`s men`s field hockey. The women have been playing too. And today in the finals champion Australia is slightly favored against the home team of the Netherlands. I wish them both well, but I have to confess that is not the World Cup that has given me a case of World Cup fever. I have a feeling I`m not alone in this. The symptoms of World Cup fever, and what you need to know as you`re riding it out, that`s still ahead this morning. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KORNACKI: Chances are that everything you remember about Martha Coakley you learned in a few shocking weeks in January of 2010. Coakley was the Democratic candidate in the special election to replace the late Ted Kennedy. Even though she was running in what may be the bluest state in America, Massachusetts, she somehow lost to Scott Brown. Do you remember how traumatic a moment this was for Democrats everywhere and how triumphant it was for the Tea Party? Barack Obama was just one year into his presidency, the recession was worsening, his poll numbers were falling and health care seemed to be hanging in the balance. Democrats had exactly 60 votes in the Senate. That`s the number they needed to break a Republican filibuster and to pass a bill. Well, they had those 60 votes until Coakley`s loss left them with just 59. On the eve of Coakley`s loss, then Democratic Congressman Barney Frank declared that, quote, "If Scott Brown wins, it will kill the health bill." And actually that was just about everybody thought back then. And what made Democrats really mad is that they believed Coakley had blown it, that she had squandered what should have been an easy win with some mortal self-inflicted wounds, like the vacation she took just three weeks before Election Day. When she came back from that vacation and answered a question about whether she was taking the race for granted by saying, quote, "As opposed to standing outside Fenway Park in the cold, shaking hands?" And, of course, she had this to say about the support Scott Brown was getting from Curt Schilling, he`s a local hero in Massachusetts for leading the Red Sox past the hated Yankees in the first World Series in 86 years.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DAN REA: Scott Brown is Curt Schilling, Ok?

MARTHA COACKLEY (D-MA) ATTORNEY GENERAL: And another Yankee fan?

REA: Schilling?

COACKLEY: Yes.

REA: Curt Schilling a Yankee fan?

COACKLEY: No. All right. I`m on .

REA: The Red Sox great pitcher of the bloody sock?

COACKLEY: Well, he`s not there anymore.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KORNACKI: On election night Coakley lost to Brown by five points. Republicans rejoiced and Democrats mourned. And for most people, that was probably the last they heard from Martha Coakley, now more than four years ago. So most people outside Massachusetts don`t know what happened next. What happened when Martha Coakley went on with her life, because she was still attorney general of Massachusetts? So she went back to that job. She got re-elected in 2010. She rebuilt her image in Massachusetts and within a few years she had the highest approval rating of any elected official in the state. And then the state`s governor, Duval Patrick, announced he wouldn`t run for a third term this year and so Coakley threw her hat in the ring. And look at this, she`s way ahead of the Democratic field, she`s also ahead of the Republican candidate, the presumptive Republican candidate, Charlie Baker. But then came yesterday. This was the first major test of this new campaign for Martha Coackley, the first test of whether her party is ready to take a chance on her once again. And her strategy was to confront all of those ugly memories head on.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

COACKLEY: The 2010 Senate election was very painful for a lot of people in this room. I understand how much of your heart and soul was in that race. Mine too. I know how hard so many of you worked in that race, and I thank you for that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KORNACKI: That was at the Massachusetts state Democratic convention in Worcester yesterday. And when all the votes were counted at that convention, Coackley was barely in second place, losing by double digits to Steve Grossman, he`s the state treasurer and the former chairman of the Democratic National Committee and just ahead of the third candidate, Don Berwick. There`s going to be a primary because every candidate who got more than 15 percent yesterday can run in it, but Grossman is now the officially endorsed candidate of the Massachusetts Democratic Party. And the bigger threat to Coakley are the headlines. She has been benefiting from name recognition and from a sense of inevitability. Now the story is that she`s lost a big test. She`s lost her party`s endorsement and all those bad memories from 2010 are being revived. Before the convention Grossman said that Coakley, if she lost, would have to, quote, "do a lot of soul searching about whether to stay in the race." Well, she`s staying in the race and, again, she`s been well ahead in the polls and she may well stay ahead.

But this was big news in Massachusetts yesterday. Coakley`s opponents got almost exactly what they wanted out of the convention while Coakley herself is left to convince the world that we`re not watching history repeat itself. So where does this race, where does Martha Coakley`s bid for the ultimate redemption, where does it go from here? We`re joined now by the candidate who won that convention yesterday, Steve Grossman, he`s the Massachusetts state treasurer. He`s now the state`s Democratic Party`s officially endorsed candidate for governor. Mr. Grossman, thanks for joining us this morning. So, you know, nationally people remember Martha Coakley from 2010 and we`re saying here the threat to her is what these headlines might look like. Let me just put up a taste of what it looks like in Massachusetts right now. This is "The Boston Herald." This was yesterday as it became clear she was going to be losing in this convention. You know, Coakley way ahead in the polls, could make history as the first woman elected governor and the party is poised to reject her. "Really?" In shouting print there, as "The Boston Herald" style. Let me just ask you, you said before this convention, if she doesn`t win, she has some soul searching to do. She didn`t win, you won by 12 points. Do you think Martha Coakley should be thinking about getting out of this race?

STEVE GROSSMAN, (D) MA CANDIDATE FOR GOVERNOR: No, I don`t think she should be thinking about getting out of the race, but I think she does have some soul searching to do. I mean after all, if you look at the history of Massachusetts politics for governor, from Michael Dukakis, 1974, to Duval Patrick, 40 years, no Democrat has been elected governor without a passionate army of activists behind them. I mean passion, energy, activism, organizing. You need that passion. She`s got a passion gap and .

KORNACKI: What is the soul searching? What is the soul searching she needs to do, then? She doesn`t need to think about getting out of the race. What do you mean by soul searching?

GROSSMAN: Well, soul searching means how do you connect with people? When you`re the front runner, when you are ahead by a lot in the polls mostly because of name recognition and you are not able to win a convention nomination, as a matter of fact when you`re rejected by more than three-quarters of the delegates in the hall, you begin to ask yourself the question, I think, what`s wrong and why can`t I connect with people? Look, this race is going to come down to one simple very clear comparison. I`m the progressive job creator in the race who spent my life in business and as treasurer creating jobs. Martha Coakley is a career prosecutor. I`m going to give people a very clear choice between a job creator and a prosecutor and we`ll let the people decide that on September 9th.

KORNACKI: She, I mean in her speech yesterday, she came right out and she addressed the issue of 2010, of the race against Scott Brown, of how -- the effect that had sort of on the psyche of Democrats in Massachusetts and nationally too. I have talked to people who were at this convention, you know, Democratic activists who say they still do have reservations about Martha Coakley as a general election candidate and they`re saying that`s why there`s resistance to her at this convention that you`re maybe not seeing in the polls. Do you think it`s fair when you look back at 2010 and you look at all these sort of factors that were in the air? I mean we just played sort of the greatest hits reel as it were that usually tried it out, when you talk about Martha Coakley and that campaign, but do you look back at that and say, yes, she did blow that race?

GROSSMAN: The buck stops with the candidate. At the end of the day, when all the consultants give you all the advice, you`ve got to go out there and show people that you care about their lives, that you can create jobs. We have 237,000 people out of work in this state. 800,000 people on food stamps. You`ve got to be able to show people that you connect with them and with their deepest concerns. I think I`m able to do that. I think I`ve been able to do that during this campaign. I don`t have the name recognition she has, but that`s what the next three months are all about. But I`m on the road today, tomorrow and every day talking about jobs, and talking about the economic future and I`m doing it based on a track record as a job creator in the private sector and a state treasurer who created jobs using that office. Martha Coakley will have to stand on her own two feet, but she`s not a job creator. She`s not somebody who`s connected to the economy and to people`s economic challenges and needs. And that`s a big problem for somebody who`s going to try to create a connection. You know, action and passion, we know that phrase, action and passion is not something the Coakley campaign had in 2010 and is certainly not something the Coakley campaign has in 2014.

KORNACKI: I just want to ask you because we`re talking about this as Steve Grossman and Martha Coakley. There is a third candidate who qualified for the ballot and it was a bit of a surprise yesterday how well Don Berwick, who used to run the Medicare and Medicaid program. It was a bit of a surprise how he nearly beat her for second place. I`ve heard from people he`s pitched his message really at the progressive base of the Democratic Party and I`ve heard people say that Steve Grossman ought to be worried about Don Berwick because Don Berwick is catching fire with the grassroots. And Grossman wanted - with Martha Coakley. Are you a little worried about how well Don Berwick did yesterday?

GROSSMAN: Well, I`m not worried about how this is going to play out. We have three people in the race. I`m the one person in this race who spent a lifetime creating jobs, good jobs and who has a progressive track record all my life. I think people have known me from all the way back at the beginning through my career in business and through my career in public service. So this is, I think, going to be fundamentally -- it`s going to come down to a race between me and Martha Coakley. But Don Berwick will be in the race. He`s a distinguished doctor, but this is about jobs and also about fiscal discipline and responsibility. Who can run government? I`ve spent the last four years I think doing a pretty solid job, running the treasury of this commonwealth and all of its component parts so fiscal responsibility. And who is going to go out there and protect the taxpayer`s dollar? That`s an important ingredient on this. Jobs, fiscal responsibility, who`s going to protect the taxpayer and who`s going to create that energetic army of activists all over the state. I believe I can do it. I don`t think Martha Coakley can.

KORNACKI: All right, I want to point out that we did invite Martha Coakley to be on the program this morning, we`d welcome her as a guest any time. My thanks to Steve Grossman, he`s a Democratic candidate for governor of Massachusetts. And you also got some other good news yesterday, we should point this out, the arrival of a new grandson. So you win the state convention, you become a grandpa, Happy Father`s day to you and congratulations on that.

GROSSMAN: Right in the middle of the convention at 3:19, little baby Jack was born. I`ve got to tell you, it was a great day and the most memorable part of the day is not the winning of the convention, although I`m proud of it, it`s having that little, little healthy grand baby arriving yesterday at 3:19.

KORNACKI: I`m sure it`s a day you`ll remember now forever.

GROSSMAN: I will. Thank you.

KORNACKI: So congratulations on that anyway.

Every four years like clockwork many Americans begin to feel the urge to call soccer football. I`m not one of them, I always call it soccer. But anyway, then they pretend to understand how the offside rule actually works. These are just some of the symptoms of World Cup fever and I`m afraid I have become a victim of it. Luckily former members of the U.S. national team are here to talk me through it. That`s next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KORNACKI: Today marks day four of the World Cup in Brazil. With another full day of matchups ahead in what`s considered to be the biggest game of the day, Ecuador will take on Switzerland at noon so I guess we`ll find out if Switzerland actually has any fans or if the Swiss are neutral in soccer too. I have to say, I don`t follow soccer that much, but around this time every four years I come down with a pretty intense case of World Cup fever. And I`d say the fever kicked in for me this year sometime on Thursday afternoon. That`s when I looked up from my desk just in time to see Holland`s Robin van Persie lounge into the air, redirect the ball with head and score one of the most ridiculous goals I`ve ever seen. The Netherlands went on to beat Spain in that game. That`s the team that beat them in the World Cup championship game four years ago. The tables were turned on third day. The score was five to one for the Netherlands. A moment every American fan is waiting for comes tomorrow. That`s when the U.S. team will make - will take the field for its first game against Ghana, the same team that knocked them out four years ago in South Africa. And every game, of course, is crucial in the World Cup, but this one is especially big for the Americans who have been thrown into what`s being called the group of death. After Ghana they`ll play Portugal and then Germany, two of the best teams in the world. So getting off to a good start tomorrow is hugely important. Four years ago the U.S. team produced a moment that fans will remember for the rest of their lives. Desperately needing a win over Algeria to advance out of the opening round, the game tied, the clock ticking past 90 minutes, into injury time, the referee ready to blow the whistle any second to end the game, to end the American dream and then out of nowhere, a breakaway, a shot, a rebound and a goal or one of the biggest goals in American soccer history by Landon Donovan. For Americans that thrilling moment of ecstasy was just a small taste of what other countries have been experiencing for decades. Soccer is the world sport and we`re still playing catch-up but we are starting to get there. I`m hardly the only American who gets World Cup fever this time every four years and that`s exactly how FIFA, the global organization that runs international soccer, wants you to feel. Your attention, your enthusiasm, your dollars all captured by a big splashy and exciting event.

The Brazilians were probably feeling that excitement seven years ago when it was announced that Brazil would be hosting the event this year in 2014. The country`s minister of sports expressing enthusiasm at the conclusion of the last World Cup about the potential boon to turn that would be for Brazil. Adding that "the world will be surprised by the country it will be discovering in 2014. That was probably true, but a lot happened in the seven years it took to get Brazil ready for the World Cup. Stadiums built well behind schedule, construction workers killed in the pressured rush to catch up. Massive protests over the transportation hikes to pay for all of it. And workers strikes in the days immediately before the games. But despite all that, here we are again. I`ll be watching it 5:30 tomorrow and pulling for the U.S. and a lot of you probably will too. So where does all this enthusiasm come from? Will it last? Does the U.S. even have a shot of pulling off major upsets in basically all of its games?

Well, joining me now is Bruce Murray, he`s a member of the 1990 U.S. World Cup team and the member of the National Soccer Hall of Fame, George Vecsey is a long-time sports writer, one of the first to cover the sport of soccer, now a contributing columnist with "The New York Times" and author of the new book "Eight World Cups: a Journey through the Beauty and Dark Side of Soccer." In Washington, Brianna Scurry, she`s a former goalkeeper for the U.S. national team, winner of the World Cup championship in 1999, I think we all remember that cam e- the two-time Olympic gold medal winner. Welcome to you as well. George, let me just start with you as somebody who`s covered a lot of these World Cups and you probably get into this even more than I do every four years. But is part of the fun for an American watching the World Cup and watch the U.S. in the World Cup, is part of the fun that this is a sport where we`re not that good at and we`re the underdog and it`s a real challenge to win these games? Like when I think of the Olympics and the dream team and the basketball team, they win by 60 or 70 points and it`s kind of boring to watch. Every game for the United States is like this is amazing if we can win this. Is that part of it?

GEORGE VECSEY, AUTHOR & COLUMNIST: But every soccer game is like that around the world. I mean it`s like that for Italy. Italy has - and every game they play in the World Cup. So it`s - I don`t think the United States wants to be an underdog. I don`t think that`s the plan at all. The plan is for when they can win everything 4-0 in their region and 2-0 in the World Cup.

KORNACKI: Well, that would be kind of boring.

VECSEY: You`ll live to see that.

KORNACKI: Well, let`s talk about that, Bruce, the evolution. So 1990 when you guys made the World Cup, it was in Italy that year, the first time in 40 years the United States has even qualified for this thing. It was almost sort of a miracle they qualified in the first place. You went 0-3, but just getting there was the huge accomplishment. When you look back at the experience for the U.S. and what it was like for this country and sort of as fans in this country in 1990 and you look at what`s playing out right now, what kind of changes have you seen in the last quarter century?

BRUCE MURRAY, 1990 U.S. WOLRD CUP TEAM: Well, Steve, it`s incredible, the amount of interest in the sport and the way it`s grown in the last 20 years is just absolutely incredible. The United States now can put a competitive product on the field and we can win. We have a puncher`s chance to be in every game in this World Cup. I`m very impressed with this U.S. team. They`re set up in attack mode. We have outside batch going forward. Jurgen Klinsmann has set this team up in a way to put pressure on the other teams, versus sitting back and absorbing pressure.

KORNACKI: I`ve got to ask you as part of that pressure that he`s putting on the other teams saying that the U.S.-- this was a quote that got a little bit of attention. This in in "The New York Times" magazine on June 4. This is the coach of the U.S. team. "We cannot win this World Cup because we are not at that level yet. For us we have to play the game of our lives seven times to win the tournament. And then he leans back and he shrugs and says realistically it is not possible." I know he`s German and maybe there`s a different way of talking about games ahead of time and there`s a cultural difference here, but an American coach talking that way, I think American fans - I think say, what is he doing?

MURRAY: No, I think he`s trying to motivate the team and that`s his way of doing it. He`s made a couple of controversial decisions in terms of Eddie Johnson being left off the 30-man roster. Landon Donovan, arguably the best player to ever play this game for the United States is sitting on the couch. So he better get it right at the World Cup or there`s going to be a lot of people .

KORNACKI: A lot of second guessing.

MURRAY: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.

KORNACKI: Brianna, well, let me bring it to you, because I said, 1999, I mean you think about soccer in the last generation or so in the United States and just the rapid growth of it. One of the signature moments is the U.S. winning that game in front of a full rose bowl in 1999. President Clinton is there, televised on national television. It strikes me when I think of that, in a lot of major sports there`s a real gap, I think, in fan interest between maybe the men`s game and the women`s game. It seems that Gap is a lot narrower in soccer than in any other sport.

BRIANNA SCURRY, 1999 U.S. WORLD CUP CHAMPION: I would absolutely agree with you, Steve. The one thing I will say about our men`s team this year, after watching the first couple of games of this World Cup, I have more faith than ever in our men`s team being able to possibly get out that group of death. With the games like, for example, Netherlands beating Spain which you`d mentioned yesterday, Costa Rica won over Uruguay, and also, Ivory Coast came back to win. And so, this, if any World Cup is a possible World Cup breakthrough for them, it`s this one. So, I would encourage everyone to be watching because you might see something amazing.

KORNACKI: George, you are nodding ahead at that.

VECSEY: Oh, there have been some amazing results so far today. You know, these people are modest. Now, Bruce isn`t going to tell you that he scored a goal that almost was part of a goal against Italy in 1990 and Brianna won`t brag, but she saved an awful lot of goals in 1999. I was there to watch. These are two terrific World Cup athletes under pressure.

KORNACKI: What`s - what the state of soccer as a major sport in the country right now, when I grew up I think if you had to rank them, I think baseball was probably number one, football, basketball, hockey, and then soccer was somewhere after that. I think football might now be number one. I think it`s kind of grown that way. Where does soccer stack up? Has it caught up to hockey yet? Can we call it a major sport right now?

MURRAY: Steve, I think it has. As a matter of fact, all these guys that played soccer in high school now that have young children, these are the guys that are supporting the United States, supporting the league. Soccer has grown exponentially and I believe it`s only a matter of time before soccer does leapfrog hockey.

MURRAY: Yeah, it`s - it`s the ball easier to see in the pocket - as some - I still can`t - the score, I don`t know. In soccer, you always know. Brianna, maybe just give us - if you were down there in Brazil right now, the team`s about to take the field tomorrow, what do you tell the Americans? The first game against Ghana, they beat them four years ago. What`s the pep talk?

SCURRY: I would definitely say the pep talk is go out there, be creative, be yourselves and enjoy the moment. Because like I said, this World Cup seems to be the World Cup of upsets and if anyone else can have an upset, then why can`t the USA? And so now if you had asked me a week ago, Steve, what I thought the U.S.`s chances were, I would have said all the sun and the moon has to align in order for the U.S. to get out of the group. But after seeing these last few games, I think they have as much chance as anyone of getting out of that group of death.

KORNACKI: All right. We`ll see. It`s going to be really fun to watch. I mean is the group of death, but that`s what makes it fun, I think. Every game.

SCURRY: Absolutely.

KORNACKI: I want to thank columnist George Vecsey for joining us, former U.S. soccer players Bruce Murray and Brianna Scurry, thank you all for joining us this morning.

SCURRY: Thank you.

KORNACKI: What should you know today? My answer right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KORNACKI: This is the part of the show where I usually ask our guests what we know now we didn`t know when the week began. I didn`t know when the show began that my father was -- it`s Father`s Day. I knew he was in town, but my father is here. This is my dad. He has the same name as me. That was very creative naming me Steve. I appreciate that. But he`s here. Happy Father`s Day, dad.

STEVE KORNACKI SR.: Thank you.

KORNACKI: And you can bring a pastry home with you.

STEVE KORNACKI SR: Thank you.

KORNACKI: Don`t eat it now because you have to talk. What do we tell people at home? Here`s the thing I was thinking. We were doing a segment a few minutes ago about the Massachusetts governor`s race. And I think some people are always saying why are they talking about that. Well, you know, I`m from Massachusetts, I grew up, you know, we grew up in Grotton (ph), you know, outside Lowell and the first thing that really got me interested in politics was the Massachusetts governor`s race in 1990. In my school, I played the role of John Silver, he was one of the candidates for governor that year. And he lost. And that was sort of the start of my, you know, obsession with politics.

STEVE KORNACKI SR.: Well, I remember that obsession, Steve. I remember that incident, but also a couple of other things. If we remember the Bob Hart graves write-in campaign.

KORNACKI: And everybody at home is going to .

STEVE KORNACKI SR: And everybody .

(CROSSTALK)

STEVE KORNACKI SR: But the thing that I remember most back then is how you got so taken with politics with the book "Grassroots" about the New Hampshire primary. Since we lived in Grotton, which was right by the border, every weekend you would drag me out to take a look up in New Hampshire where the story unfolded.

KORNACKI: Great. And now everybody - We have now shared just a little bit of my dorkiness. Which is - I think it was great job. And no, it was. Thank you, dad. And I want to thank you for joining us. Happy Father`s day to you. We will see you back here next week. And coming up next is Melissa Harris-Perry. Today, on MHP, the tough take on tenure from a California judge. A victory for "Star Wars" nerds. 20 years since the world`s most famous car chase. And 50 years since (INAUDIBLE). It is a jam pack that makes me stick around. Nerdland is next.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.END

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